Building Traditions
by sandyfin
Summary: Jamie sees no reason for a single guy who lives alone to bother with pesky decorations in December. Eddie has other ideas.
1. Chapter 1

_**A/N:**_ _My early gift to you: some festive holiday Jamko fluff. Also, Jamie's clothes aren't specified, so feel free to imagine him in boxers this entire time if his usual jeans-and-henley look doesn't do it for you. ;) Merry Christmas! -Sandy_

* * *

Jamie jumps at the sudden, insistent sound of the buzzer that hits his ears over the college basketball game he's watching. With a curious arch of one eyebrow, he checks his phone to make sure he's not missing something he's supposed to know about before he sets his beer on the side table and gets up to see who it is.

"Yeah?"

"Hey, it's me," Eddie says. "Come down here and help me."

"Help you _what_? I'm not giving you a piggyback ride up the stairs, Janko, I don't care if it was the worst leg day of your life-"

"Hurry up!"

He wishes she could see the dramatic eye roll he directs at the wall as he pushes the button to unlock the building door. "It's open. Get your ass up here."

"No, you get _your_ ass down here and help me!"

"Nope." He lets go of the button to meander back to the couch before he even says the whole word.

Before he can sink into the leather cushions again, Eddie's laying on the buzzer once more. Jamie glances at his beer and considers turning up the TV volume until she quits, but he knows she'll outlast him so with a resigned sigh he shoves his feet into the worn-out New Balances in the entryway and heads downstairs.

"Finally!" Eddie cries when Jamie cracks open the door and peers at her through the narrow gap. "Do you have any gloves?"

"What - gloves? No, Eddie-"

"Okay here, use mine and take this. I have to run back to my car-"

Jamie has no time to react as Eddie pulls off the gardening gloves she wears, shoves them against his chest, and somehow finds his hand to tug him out onto the stoop. There he nearly trips over a Christmas tree bound with twine and all he can do is wedge one foot in the door before it shuts, staring behind Eddie as she bounces away through the fat snowflakes that float sleepily through the fading late-afternoon light.

"The hell, Janko," he mutters to himself.

There's no way his hands will fit into Eddie's tiny purple gloves so he clutches them under one arm and tries not to flinch at the prickly needles as he finds a good grip on the tree. He's managed to drag the damn thing all the way to the hall outside his fourth-floor walkup and he's wrestling it towards his front door when Eddie catches up to him.

"Good!" she exclaims. "You made it. That tree's heavier than it looks. I had to drag it two blocks from my car..."

"Uh yeah - what are you and this tree doing here, exactly?"

"We wouldn't have to be if you weren't such a Scrooge. Here, move."

Jamie flattens himself against the wall as she squeezes by, weighed down by several bags and a good-sized brown box decorated with some kind of shimmery metallic appliqué. He can't help his entertained smirk while she balances the box between one hip and his doorframe, freeing a hand to let them inside.

"What's - that mean?" he calls after her through the effort of yanking the tree forward the last few feet.

" _What's the point of putting a tree up in my apartment?_ " Eddie says, her voice deep and mocking. " _I'll just have to take it down in a month and that's just extra work and I have no Christmas spirit at all, bah humbug_."

"What?" he scoffs. "I never put it like _that-_ "

"Yeah, you basically did. And I can't let you be miserable so here, where should we set this up? In front of that window?"

Jamie's brows draw together in restrained amusement as she shakes a tree stand free of the plastic grocery bag she used to carry it here. "What I _said_ was," he insists, "the Sunday after Thanksgiving my sister makes us all help put up the tree and decorate at my dad's and that's more fun than trying to decorate this place. It's just me and I'm hardly ever here."

"You're here right now," she points out.

"Yeah, and it's the first night all week."

"And putting up your tree is the perfect way to spend it!"

Jamie just chuckles at her, finding his beer and watching as she shoves his living room chair forward against his coffee table to make room for the tree stand behind it.

"Okay - put those gloves back on and then can you pick up the tree and bring it over here? You don't want to cut the string until it's up-"

He holds up her gloves and tosses them to the coffee table. "If you think my hands will fit in these things you're insane, Janko."

She peeks up from where she crouches behind the chair to set up the stand. "Not my fault!"

Kneeling on the chair, he reaches over its back to show her the red scratches that cover his hands. "Yeah, this is."

"Don't be a baby."

"I'm not! You brought me a killer tree!"

Eddie offers a dramatic groan towards the ceiling. "Fine, come hold this still then."

"No, no, you stay there. I can do it…"

"Apparently you can't."

Standing, Eddie steers Jamie around the chair with hands on his back and then goes over to the entryway where the tree lies pathetically on its side just past the door. Jamie is anchored in place and he can't help the laugh that rumbles out of him as Eddie puts on the gloves and manages to loop one arm underneath the widest part of the bound tree. She hoists it up in the crook of her elbow, not quite able to maneuver it all the way onto her shoulder and the top branches drag on the floor behind her as she moves further into the apartment.

Jamie watches until Eddie begins a precarious turn to avoid the couch, nearly sweeping the legs out from under his side table in the process. Then he scrambles forward to lift the top half of the tree off the ground and avoid some kind of disaster.

"Don't touch it!" Eddie teases. "The sharp, pointy needles might stick you!"

"Well - if the choice is scratching up my hands or wrecking my living room, my hands are cheaper to deal with."

"Hold the stand with your foot," Eddie orders, all business again as she eases to her knees to direct the tree stump into the stand. "And tip up the top so I can get it - into the - okay perfect. Is it straight? Hold it there so I can tighten the screws."

"Um, no, you hold it straight with your tiny gloves and I'll tighten."

Her eyes light up with a cheerful giggle as she stands and walks her hands up the tree to keep it in place.

"Got it?" Jamie confirms before he bends to tighten the stand's four large screws against the trunk to hold the tree upright.

Eddie gives it a gentle back-and-forth push between her hands to make sure it's not going anywhere, then lets go and steps around Jamie to assess the tree from across the room. "Looks good," she decides. "Here, spread this out this underneath." She tosses a red lump of thick quilted fabric at Jamie - he realizes it's a tree skirt - before she pads to the kitchen in her socks to help herself to a beer from his fridge.

With the skirt in place he makes his way back to his own beer but he gets distracted by the rest of Eddie's crap tossed carelessly across his couch. "What's all this?"

"Um, _decorations_. You wanna start testing the lights? I found them in my mom's garage and I have no idea if they're any good."

"Your mom's garage?"

"Yeah, I don't have room for this stuff at my place," she says, as if it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"Oh, of _course_."

"There's plain white and multicolored - I like white but I wasn't sure for you," Eddie continues. "And the garland - are you feeling this ribbon? I thought I liked it but now I think the sparkly one is better."

She leans over the back of the couch, beer in one hand while the other fishes through the bags to display the contents as she mentions them. Jamie just lets her talk, his lips stretched into a lopsided smirk at her overflowing enthusiasm. He guesses this is all because of a passing comment of his in the car the other night - that he doesn't put up any Christmas decorations of his own - and she must've decided that pointing out every holiday display in the city since then like it's proof of his ultimate lameness wasn't enough.

She continues to ask for his opinions without allowing him the time to give them. He steps sideways while she rambles to take the lid off the decorated box she brought inside. Tugging at a wrinkled corner of balled-up tissue paper, he reveals a wooden rocking horse and realizes that each compartment of the gridded dividers inside the box contains a few ornaments wrapped protectively for storage.

"What are you doing?" Eddie snaps, suddenly aware of him again. "No ornaments until we're done with lights and garlands - don't you know how to decorate a tree?"

"Okay, sorry!" Jamie laughs as he brings his free hand to hs shoulder in a show of innocence.

"Find an outlet and figure out which lights work."

He takes the grocery bag of Christmas lights she hands him and ducks behind the tree to plug them in. A moment later the sound of the basketball game he was watching disappears.

"I was watching that!" he calls. "Janko-"

"Since when do you care about Virginia Tech basketball? We need Christmas music."

He knows it's useless to argue so he directs his mental energy to wondering how Eddie manages to send the opening guitar of "Jingle Bell Rock" bouncing through the room so quickly - either she pulled the song up on his phone, which wouldn't surprise him because she's known his passcode since always; or her own phone is synced to the small bluetooth speaker on his kitchen counter, which would be news to him but not all that surprising either. And when he shifts, feeling the pressure of his phone still in his pocket, he shakes his head a little at the realization that it's the second one.

Testing the lights isn't as simple a task as Jamie anticipates. There are five or six strands tangled into a hopeless knot and he can barely tug the plug ends free enough to test them in the outlet, much less unravel the entire mass to keep track of which strands he's already tested. Finally he lets out a groan of frustration and drops the whole thing over the back of the armchair onto the seat.

"This is impossible," he complains as he shuffles around on his knees. "I don't know what hole in the ground you dug these out of - hey, what're you doing? You drag all this shit up here and then park your ass on my couch-"

"Shut up," Eddie scoffs, narrowing her eyes at him as she takes a sip of her beer. "I'm strategizing."

Jamie grabs the ball of lights from the chair and makes a show of stepping over Eddie's legs that are propped on his coffee table. "Strategizing _what_?"

"Decorations! I think there's a wreath hanger in my car - we can grab you a nice simple wreath for your door, red bow, nothing flashy-"

" _Wreaths_ now? And who carries a _wreath hanger_ around in their car? Can we deal with _this_ whole situation before we start talking about anything else?"

Eddie giggles, recoiling when he drops the lights heavily onto her lap from his spot on the other end of the couch. "Nope, this is all you," she says, pushing the ball back across the cushions until it stops against his leg. "I'm gonna start on the other stuff. We'll worry about a wreath later."

"No wreath!"

Ignoring him, Eddie plants her feet on the floor and gets up, brushing past his knees on her way back to the kitchen. "Time to see what this baby really looks like."

He pretends to fiddle with the lights but really he's keeping a sideways eye on Eddie as she digs for scissors in his kitchen drawer. When she finds them she comes back over to the tree and cuts the twine that binds it. It takes her a minute to pull it all away and then the tree finally stands uninhibited and hugely fat in the cramped space between the chair and the window.

"Yes! I picked a good one," she announces. "Good shape, no dead branches…"

"You didn't _look at it_ before you brought it over here?"

"Hard to do that when they're already tied up in a pile inside that little landscaping place," she explains. "It was a gamble. And it paid off."

"Well - it looks so good by itself I don't think it needs any lights."

"It needs lights! Keep untangling. Hurry up. I've always done the lights first but I think it'll be okay if I start the ribbon while you work on that…"

While she considers for a minute, Jamie looks for the remote to unmute the basketball game. He sees it behind him on the kitchen counter, way out of reach from his spot on the couch, dammit.

"It should be fine," Eddie decides. She grabs the wide, shimmering gold ribbon from a bag - Jamie rolls his eyes at how nicely wound it is and of course _he's_ stuck dealing with the tangled mess - and starts to circle it around the tree from the bottom up.

Eddie holds a one-sided conversation about whether Thai food or pizza will be better tree-decorating fuel when it's time for meal break. Jamie would offer his opinion - pizza, or Chinese if that's what Eddie's in the mood for, but not Thai - if she slowed down to take a breath every so often, but she doesn't. Oh well, he's a little busy anyway with this damn _ball of lights from hell_ that, after ten minutes of meticulous concentration, is about three percent of the way untangled.

"Eddie," he finally sighs. "It's hopeless. This dumb tree isn't having lights - I'm done."

"What? No!" She pauses as she shimmies sideways to get out from behind the tree. "It _has_ to have lights or else what's the point?"

"Well it's not going to have _these_ lights," he snaps.

Eddie frowns at him as he tosses the lights aside onto the couch with an irritated groan. "Come on, Jamie-"

"I'll do the ribbon," he offers, voice softer now. "You try to get somewhere with the stupid lights."

"Fine - _you_ try to get somewhere with the stupid ribbon - do you have a stepstool in this place?"

"Don't need one. Out of my way, shorty."

He shoulders her away from the tree as he takes the remaining roll of ribbon. She pretends to put up a fight, swiping for it over Jamie's forearm defensively braced in her direction until she dissolves into hysterical giggles and gives up.

"Lights!" he reminds her with one more playful shove towards the couch. "Get moving. This is _your_ project."

"My project to do a nice thing for _you_." It sounds like she's still arguing but she directs a glittery joking sneer his way as she grabs the mess of lights.

"I didn't ask you to!"

Jamie doesn't miss the way she scoffs up at the ceiling just before he squeezes behind the tree to keep going with the ribbon. It's a much easier job and he finishes pretty quickly with three more revolutions. He's too focused to worry about what Eddie's doing so he doesn't realize she's left the couch until he comes around for the last time and nearly trips over her where she squats on the floor next to the outlet.

"Look! We've got two!" she says, and before he can ask what she means she plugs an untangled strand of white lights into the wall so they illuminate the dark corner behind the tree.

"How'd you do that?"

She shrugs and flicks a smile at him over her shoulder. "Christmas spirit."

Pulling the white lights away from the wall, Eddie fumbles in the momentary darkness until the purplish warmth of a multicolored strand takes their place. "I hope two's enough," she muses. "Ugh - it would look better if they were the same - but you don't mind, do you?"

"No, I don't mind - let's just get lights on the damn tree."

Eddie agrees, plugging the white strand into the free end of the multicolored one, and it takes conscious effort for Jamie to tear his gaze away from how the whimsical glow softly highlights Eddie's features, the curve of her cheek edging her smile and the mischievous spark in her bright blue eyes-

"Jamie!"

"Hmm? Yeah."

"I said you should just do this since you can reach all the way to the top. I'm gonna order some food." She gives him the looped lights draped over her hand and scoots away to make the call.

Soon the lights are up - it _does_ look weird that the top half of the tree is white and the bottom is colorful, but he's not about to say that to Eddie - and Thai food is on the way.

"You better not have gotten me that spicy crap you ordered last time," he warns just before he lets himself fall onto the couch with an exaggerated groan of exhaustion.

"I got you the blandest thing on the menu, don't worry," she says. "I'm pretty sure it won't even count as Thai food."

"Perfect, sounds delicious."

"Sounds disgusting. How come you're sitting down? We're not done. Ornaments!"

"I've got a tree. With lights on it. Isn't that enough? Ornaments are a pain."

Eddie straightens and plants a hand on her hip. "I have never met someone who is so _ugh_ about Christmas. You're Catholic! It's supposed to be a big deal, Jesus being born and all." She tosses the lid of the box at him and he can detect the hint of genuine irritation underriding her tone.

"It is a big deal. But Jesus doesn't care about whether or not I have a tree full of ornaments that I'll just have to take down in six days."

She scowls. "Not six days - you can leave the tree up til New Years. And it's going to have ornaments whether you help me or not. What're you going to do when you have kids someday, huh? _Oh, sorry kiddos, we don't get a Christmas tree because Grandpa has one in Bay Ridge_?"

"Come on, that's different. Of course I'll have a tree _then._ But for now it's just me."

"And _me_. And I'm not letting you _not_ have ornaments on your tree. Now's the time you start building the traditions that'll matter then, you know."

Jamie doesn't exactly buy her argument - in five or ten years, when any hypothetical children he has are the perfect age to revel in that Christmas magic, he doubts they'll ask about their father's apartment decorations from before they were born. And he already knows what his future family's big traditions will be: church on Christmas Eve, breakfast of homemade cinnamon rolls made with his grandma's recipe, and presents before heading to his dad's for family dinner. But now there's something else in that picture - a flash of blonde hair and the curry smell of Thai food as his kids, who he imagines with blue eyes all of a sudden, reach up to hook wooden rocking horses onto nearby branches-

He feels his jaw clench and he clears his head with a little shake. "Okay, okay, alright," he concedes. "But this means you're coming over on New Years to help me take all this down."

"I was already planning on it."

"Good. Let's get this done."

Eddie presses her lips together into a satisfied little smile and hands Jamie the first ornament.

At first Jamie's mostly doing this to appease her. But he can't help but enjoy himself as Eddie sings along to "Here Comes Santa Claus" and backs herself up with an adorably dorky dance, bobbing her head and swaying her hips as she places the ornaments. He props his hips on the back of the armchair, pausing to watch her without even realizing it, until she grabs his hands and tugs him back to his feet as she sings " _You - have to - help - me - or I - won't come - back on - New Years Eve!_ " to the tune of the song. Returning his focus to the ornament box, he can't quite get his goofy grin under control. But he's not really trying that hard.

Eddie dances through two or three more songs while they work their way through the box. Her contagious enthusiasm makes Jamie lose track of the time and when the bell rings to announce the food's arrival he realizes they're almost done.

"I got it," she insists. "You finish this - since you're having so much fun."

"I'm having fun dreaming about watching the second half of this basketball game without interruptions," he teasingly says to her back as she goes to the door.

He feels through the compartments of the box, searching for any last ornaments hidden among the old paper that Eddie insists on saving for when it's time to repack everything. He finds a couple of small glass balls, what looks like the tiny attachment paddle to a fancy kitchen mixer, a miniature coffee mug featuring the Flyers logo - he thinks about throwing that one out before he settles on tucking it away in a bottom corner - and one last thing so flat he almost misses it as his fingers trace across the bottom.

When Eddie turns away from the door, food in hand, he's waiting for her with narrow-eyed smugness as he holds up his find.

"What?" she questions, quirking a glancing eyebrow as she sits to spread the food across the coffee table.

He flashes the ornament closer, right under her face where she can't miss her seven-year-old self grinning up from a faded, cheaply printed yearbook photo that threatens to come unstuck from its popsicle stick frame.

"Hey! Where was that?" she cries, swiping for it.

"It's an ornament! It's going on my tree." Grinning, he backs away and turns to hang the frame by the pipe cleaner glued to the top. "I think that's the finishing touch."

"Come on," Eddie whines.

"You want me to take an ornament _off_?"

" _That_ one, yes!"

She reaches over his shoulder for the frame but he's too quick, blocking her with one arm while his other hand moves the picture out of her reach.

"No, Jamie!"

"That's my favorite thing on this tree," he insists. "Handmade and heartfelt."

"God, you're weird," she mutters.

She strains against him for just another second before backing down, distracted by the food. Jamie looks at it again - tiny Eddie's bangs chopped halfway up her forehead, those same sparkling blue eyes, the uneven glitter-glue _Merry Christmas_ across the popsicle sticks that form the top and bottom of the frame - and something squeezes hard inside his chest, that same fleeting image of blue eyes and matching Christmas pajamas and basil chicken in the soft light of the Christmas tree, and it forces the air out of his lungs.

He can't let himself dwell on it, not now. But his gaze drifts to Eddie, cross-legged on his couch with food in her lap and the remote in her hand - browsing Netflix for a cheesy Christmas movie, he's sure - and her comment about building traditions floats through his head as clearly as if she's saying it out loud once more. And he wonders, for just a second, if that's what they're doing right now.


	2. Chapter 2

_**A/N:**_ _One more, because I can't quit these two no matter how hard I try. Y'all have areyouserial to thank for the picture that inspired this chapter, which wasn't going to exist, but here we are. Enjoy and have a lovely Christmas!_

* * *

 _12 years and 6 days later_

"Mommy. Daddy? _Mommy_!"

That's all the warning Jamie gets before he feels movement on the bed by his feet, and then all the air thuds out of his lungs when the weight of a small body drops suddenly onto him where he sleeps on his side.

"Ouch - who's - _Alex-_ " he mumbles.

His six-year-old daughter's foot passes a little too close to his face as she clambers over him to the middle of the bed to get to her mommy. "Mommy!" she says again in a loud, strained whisper. "Santa came!"

Jamie hears the quiet noises of Eddie waking up behind his back. "Good, baby," she manages through a yawn. "But it's not time to wake up yet…"

"Yes it is, come _on_!" There's a thump against Jamie's spine as Alexis moves around some more and he shifts, groaning, onto his back.

"In a few minutes," Eddie says. "Come snuggle with me."

Cracking one eye open, Jamie sees Eddie untangle her arms from the comforter and reach for Alexis but Alexis crawls away, down and off the foot of the bed using the bench there. She scampers out of the room as Jamie calls behind her, his voice still raspy from sleep, "Don't open the gate yet, okay?"

"She can't open the gate," Eddie assures him.

"Today would be the day she figures it out."

"Or just climbs over it."

"She better not."

Shifting, Eddie squints towards her nightstand in the darkness before she adjusts closer and tucks herself against Jamie's side. "Alexis at 5:42," she murmurs, her breath warm against his neck. "I win."

Jamie looks at his own clock and groans wearily as he confirms that Eddie's right, she's won their little bet on which kid at what time would bring this morning's wakeup call. They got to bed earlier last night than past Christmas Eves thanks to Jamie's religious commitment to wrapping presents as they were purchased this year, but he'd still love another hour or two of sleep before they fully unleash the chaos of Christmas morning-

Footsteps, and he hardly has time to brace for impact as their bed is invaded once again. Alexis has brought reinforcements this time, her twin brother Leo and eight-year-old Joey, and they tip to hands and knees to crawl up near their parents' heads.

"Wake up wake up _wake up_!" they cry, abandoning the _whispering-only-in-Mom-and-Dad's-bed_ rule in their excitement. Eddie hooks one arm around somebody's middle - Leo's - and flips him over herself onto his back on top of the covers where her body is against Jamie's underneath. Jamie inches closer to the edge of the king bed that felt much too big when they bought it but now, with three - no, four, as the youngest, Max, stretches her arms at him to be lifted up to the bed - extra bodies squished in between, he wonders how much it would cost to convert the entire bedroom floor into a mattress.

"Shh - snuggle, just for a minute, it's not wake up time yet," Eddie murmurs. But the kids want no part of a calm, relaxed morning and even once Jamie and Eddie manage to coax and wrestle everyone into lying down, the writhing bodies leave them hopeless for any more rest.

Jamie gives up first, literally kicked out of his own bed by the tiny cold feet that won't quit moving under the covers. He slides out of bed and smiles to himself when he sees the four small bodies squirming and shifting under the comforter next to the stillness of Eddie trying to postpone the inevitable as long as she can. But now that his dad has gotten up, Joey slinks out from under Eddie's arm and untangles himself from the covers and it's all over, everyone is up for good.

In the bathroom Jamie takes a minute to wake up and pulls plaid pajama pants over the boxers he slept in - Eddie's a sucker for cutesy stuff like matching Christmas pajamas - before returning to the bedroom. Eddie sits up in bed now, raking her shoulder-length blonde hair out of her face with one hand while she tries to wrangle Max with the other. Eddie manages to gather most of the two-year-old's bedhead tangles into a ponytail before she wriggles away and Jamie starts to herd the crowd out of the room to give Eddie a quick second to herself.

"I wanna see what's in my stocking!" Leo pipes up.

"Stop stepping on my foot!"

"Stop putting your foot where my foot is stepping!"

Jamie works his way through the elbows flying between Alexis and Joey, warning them to cut it out before he gets to the baby gate at the bottom of the stairs. He works it open and then Joey, Alexis and Leo fly past him to get a closer look at the haul beneath the tree in the front window.

"Don't touch anything!" Jamie says. "Remember, you can bring your stockings to the kitchen but you can't touch anything else. Let's go."

Everyone grabs their stockings. Jamie helps Max with hers and it feels like some sort of unfair arms length wrestling match to keep four very distracted kids away from the sprawl of gifts under the tree - but that's how every day of parenting four kids feels and he soon steers them all to the kitchen table without grabby hands tearing open any wrapping paper, so he considers that a success.

"Are we having cimanin rolls?"

" _Cinnamon_ , stupid," Joey snaps.

"Yes but we have to bake them first," Jamie says. "Joey, come on…"

Max - definitely her mother's daughter - has crawled from her booster seat onto the table because the bowl of fruit there is more enticing than a giant fancy sock, no matter how enthusiastically her siblings dump and dig and shake to make sure there's nothing stuck at the bottom of theirs. Jamie catches her - "Margaret Marie, no climbing on the table!" - and sets her down, buckling her in this time before he sets a whole apple in her hands. Then he returns to his task of turning on the oven to bake the cinnamon rolls that were prepared from scratch in a great production after Christmas Eve mass then left to rise overnight.

"What did you get? Show me, guys!" Eddie sings, entering the kitchen in the same plaid flannel everyone else wears. A yawn gives away her lingering exhaustion but her eyes sparkle in anticipation of the day ahead, one of her favorites of the year.

"Joey said I was getting coal but I didn't!" Alexis says triumphantly.

"Joey was joking," Jamie assures her from across the kitchen.

"No I wasn't, Santa really gives you coal if you're on the-"

"Nobody here is on the naughty list except for boys who're mean to their brother and sisters," Eddie says. She verifies that Jamie has gotten coffee started and slides onto a chair. "Show me! What did Santa leave you?"

The kids excitedly show off the small random toys from their stockings and even Max is engaged now that she's caught up to what's going on. It's enough to occupy them for a few minutes so Eddie gets up to help Jamie - Christmas breakfast is a giant affair, bacon and eggs and fruit in addition to the cinnamon rolls and it's gotten harder to keep up each year as the kids have grown more impatient for presents, but it's such a highlight for Eddie that Jamie's determined to make it happen.

And, well, it's easier if everyone's fed so he won't have to listen to five cranky voices melting down in hunger the moment the last gift is unwrapped.

"Okay! Breakfast, coming up," he announces.

"Toast and peanut butter please!" Alexis yells.

"We're having Christmas breakfast, silly girl," Eddie tells her. She leans down to pull a frying pan from a lower cabinet and Jamie has to step around her on his way to the fridge.

"Hey," he teases. "You're in my way."

"Oh yeah? I'm in your way? How about now? Now? Now?"

Jamie's head ducks in laughter and he tries to defend his workspace as Eddie sidles up behind him, reaching arms around his body to grab for whatever she can reach. She comes up with milk and a random container of leftovers, which she waves in his face until he catches her wrist and pulls the leftovers away.

"Don't mess around in the kitchen, Mommy," he teases, and she offers a grinning wink over her shoulder as she tears open a pack of bacon.

The oven beeps to announce that it's up to temperature and Jamie slides the cinnamon rolls in. Within minutes their scent competes with the aromas of bacon and coffee in a delicious combination which reminds Jamie that his wife's never-ending appetite isn't the _only_ reason breakfast happens before presents around here.

Joey's the first one to leave his stocking presents at the table and make his way over. "Are you making cheesy eggs?"

"Yep, grab some plates please," Eddie says, handing him half a piece of bacon from towel-lined plate of cooked strips.

"I want bacon!" Max screeches.

"Come get some," Eddie says. "And ask kindly."

"Please!" she cries, as Jamie leans close to Eddie to tell her that Max is strapped into her seat.

"What? Why?"

"She was climbing and I only have so many hands."

"Well here, find a hand for this." Eddie hands him the bacon tongs and he mans both skillets while she goes to release the toddler before her impatient whining escalates any further.

Alexis slides off her chair and heads for the stove, where she wraps one arm around Jamie's leg and says something that Jamie translates as _Can I have some bacon?_

"Ask like a big girl," he tells her. "Daddy can't understand when you talk like a baby."

" _CanIhavesomebaconplease_?" she almost growls, still in a goofy voice but at least she's annunciating better than Max again.

"Okay, yep, get a plate."

But the colorful plastic plates Joey produces are quickly forgotten on the kitchen island as everyone gathers near the stove. Leo and Alexis can't reach everything from the stepstool they share so they both climb onto the counter where they can gobble up fresh strips of bacon as soon as they come off the heat. Max takes their spot on the stool and scavenges, working that devilish little grin of hers that earn her just about anything she wants from her parents and siblings. And Joey stands, eating cheesy scrambled eggs straight out of the pan with a fork. Jamie would tell him that's a bad idea, except Eddie does the same thing.

The cinnamon rolls cool for a moment before Eddie pours homemade frosting all over them and hands them out. Soon four small faces and two grownup ones, as well as all associated hands, are covered in sugary goodness and Grandma Betty would _not_ approve of this big a mess occurring because of anything that comes from a recipe of hers, but washcloths and sinks exist for a reason and frosting tastes _really_ good when licked from sticky fingers.

"Is it time for presents?" Alexis asks.

"Yes! Let's go!"

"Ah - wait!" Jamie lunges to catch Joey's arm before he can break free into the living room. "Wash your hands."

"And wipe your face!" Eddie adds. "Come here Maxie, let Mommy clean you up. I know, I know…"

Joey grabs the dishtowel that hangs over the oven handle and smears it once over his mouth. "Can I go?"

Jamie chuckles at his enthusiasm. "Nope, you've still got a little..."

He wets a cloth and goes down the line, cleaning the older three's faces despite their protests. Eddie guards their path away from the sink so she can check everyone's hands, and finally both parents are satisfied that everyone is sort of reasonably clean enough to head for the living room.

"Check the tags before you open anything!" Jamie shouts. "Be careful, okay? Don't be rough. Wait, wait-"

To keep the kids from tearing everything open in thirty seconds, Eddie turns handing out presents into a game. Joey sees through the ruse and pouts a little about the delays but Leo and Alexis love reading the labels and passing gifts to their recipients. Having them take turns playing Santa as everyone opens one or two gifts at a time manages the chaos just enough for Jamie and Eddie to enjoy everyone's delighted reactions - and make sure that Max doesn't get too much unsolicited help as she claws at wrapping paper a little slower than the big kids. They didn't go overboard with presents this year - eight years and four kids into this whole parenting gig there aren't many toys they don't already own - but it's not like the kids know that. They're too excited about _more_ Legos and chapter books and stuffed animals as well as useful gifts like lunchboxes and water bottles featuring characters from each kid's favorite TV show. They're pretty easy to please.

"Mommy! This one says you," Alexis announces. She hops across the cluttered living room floor to deliver a small brown bag hand-decorated with stickers and glitter, sealed at the top with red and green ribbon through punched holes.

"Oh! Who's this from?" Eddie asks.

"Me!"

"I made one for you, Dad!" Leo says. Looking around, he finds an identical package under the tree and drops it on Jamie's lap.

"Can we open them?" Jamie wonders.

"Joey - let her open it by herself. She can do it," Eddie interrupts to stop Joey from ripping the paper off the noisy book on Max's lap.

"Open it!" Alexis urges, bouncing the same way her mom does when she's excited.

Jamie and Eddie share a quiet smile before gingerly untying the ribbons to open each bag. At the same time they reach their hands in and pull out the art project from the first grade Christmas party at St. Jude's last week - foam picture frame ornaments displaying two different photos of the twins wearing huge Christmas lightbulb necklaces in front of their classroom nativity bulletin board.

"Thank you so much, guys! I love it!" Eddie gushes. "We'll put both of them on the tree right now."

Jamie thanks them too and he gets up behind Eddie to follow once she finds a spot for the frame she opened. But he's slower to sit back down for the last few gifts, including three new bikes and the big kids' hand-me-down tricycle, repainted pink by a certain grandpa with too much time on his hands, that wait in the garage. He can't wait to work on the twins' two-wheeler skills but for the moment the thought is out of his mind as he places Leo's frame on the tree. He finds its spot near three other frame ornaments, all near the top of the tree where fascinated toddlers can't reach - one is Alexis's that Eddie just hung up, and next to it is a metal frame, _not_ handmade by an elementary schooler, showing off last year's visit with Santa during Jamie's lieutenant promotion party at the precinct.

The third is one Jamie has teased Eddie about for twelve years now. She thinks he's joking when he tells her every year that it's his favorite thing on their tree, and maybe once upon a time he was. But now the sentimental attachment he feels for Eddie's faded second grade yearbook picture runs deep through his existence, so much so that he's repaired the thing with tape and hot glue more than once. He's never been sure exactly why he loves it so much - he's seen plenty of other pictures of his wife from the days before she was a badass NYPD detective, and most of those are better quality than this one on regular old printer paper. So no, as much as he loves the picture itself, that's not it.

It must have something to do with that first off-duty Christmas they sort of shared together, back when any future family was a distant figment of his imagination. But that day, that distant figment moved a little bit closer - like it was the first real step on this years-long journey of figuring out that reality is so much better than anything he could've dreamed.


End file.
